Difference between revisions of "Newest General Fiction Reviews"

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[[Category:General Fiction|*]]
 
[[Category:General Fiction|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|General Fiction]]
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[[Category:New Reviews|General Fiction]]__NOTOC__
==General fiction==
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{{Frontpage
__NOTOC__
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|author=Jenny Lecoat
{{newreview
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|title=Beyond Summerland
|author=Scott Mariani
 
|title=The Lost Relic
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Ben Hope went to Italy to visit a former SAS comrade and offer him a job, but he's got marriage and happiness – and Ben's trade is far from the front of his mindIt's whilst he's driving away that Ben nearly runs down a small boy and unwittingly walks into a deadly heist which will see the boy and his mother – and many others – brutally murdered. It's only the beginning for Ben though as he find himself fleeing for his life and accused of murder. When the state needs to act people – even heroes – are disposable.
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|summary=Jean lives on Jersey with her mother where they are celebrating the end of the occupation.  During the war, Jean's father was arrested for listening to a banned radio and soldiers took him away one night, leaving Jean and her mother waiting for years for news of him.  As the British finally free the Channel islands from the Nazis, and the war is finally over, their hopes rise that they will finally learn what became of himBut will the truth come as a relief, or will it raise further questions around what else happened during the war? Who was the informer who told the Nazis about the radio? And what other secrets have been kept throughout the occupation?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847561977</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1846976537
 
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}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Onyi Nwabineli
|author=Diane Janes
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|title=Allow Me to Introduce Myself
|title=Why Don't You Come For Me?
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Over a decade ago Jo's daughter was abducted from in front of a shop whilst she and her husband were on holidayThe pushchair was found on a cliff edge but there was no trace of Lauren, even on the beach belowOccasionally Jo receives postcards with an old picture of her daughter on the front simply saying that the writer still has LaurenThe police, the people who know what happened believe the cards to be a hoaxJo believes differentlyShe also realises that as she has moved house and remarried and the story has faded from press attention someone is going to a great deal of trouble to keep track of her.
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|summary=Anuri spent her childhood on display to the world, thanks to her step-mother Ophelia's increasingly popular presence on social media, where she posted every step of Anuri's childhood for sponsorships and influencer deals and, basically, monetary gain.  Now Anuri is in her twenties and she is slowly trying to regain her confidence and to get her life back, suing her step-mother to take down the content about her.  Anuri is battling alcoholism, failing to start her PhD, undergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and receiving money from them for doing so.  Most importantly, she is desperately worried about her little sister, who is the new focus of Ophelia's online empireCan she save her sister, and perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the same time?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849011257</amazonuk>
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|isbn=0861546873
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{{Frontpage
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|isbn=1529153298
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|title=The List of Suspicious Things
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|author=Jennie Godfrey
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|rating=5
 +
|genre=General Fiction
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|summary=It's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister(A woman?  I mean, honestly...)  She's not what's worrying Miv's family, though.  Women have been disappearingWell, they've been murdered, but to have 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frighteningMiv's upset because she's overheard that her father wants to move the family 'Down South'.  When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a frightening, foreign place, best avoided.  For Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and she'll do anything to prevent that.  She's not worried about the dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to anyone.
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1035906708
|author=G S Mattu
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|title=Diva
|title=Sons and Fascination
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|author=Daisy Goodwin
|rating=3
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|rating=4.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=This book concentrates on emotions.  Take an impressionable young man, add in a chance (?) encounter with an attractive older woman and then stand well back as the fireworks explode and as family, friends and colleagues get sucked in to their deepening relationship. I must say I'm not keen on the title (a little pretentious for a work of fiction in my opinion and more suited to poetry) and even when it was ever so gently explained later on in the book (twice) I still didn't warm to it.   All in all, not off to the greatest of starts.  
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|summary=We tend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, in December 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen. Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'Callas' to make it more manageable in the States. When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the Nazi occupation by a mother who mercilessly exploited her and made no secret of her preference for her elder sister, Jackie.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907756000</amazonuk>
 
 
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}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Alexander McCall Smith
|author=Philip Wilding
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|title=The Perfect Passion Company
|title=Cross Country Murder Song
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|rating=4.5
|rating=4
 
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The novel opens with the (unnamed) central character in a therapy session in downtown New YorkThe air is charged and tension is present, big-timeThis is one troubled human being.  And of course, childhood issues and experiences are dominant in this question and answer sessionWe soon find out that this individual has secrets in his basement.  It all becomes too much, he packs a bag and hits the road and so the story starts proper.
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|summary=The Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the online apps in providing a more personal, tailored serviceNess has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the business, as Ness is planning to take a trip to Canada to get away for a whileKatie is coming out of a break up with a bad boyfriend, and so jumps at the chance to come home to Edinburgh.  And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the Isabel Dalhousie novels, but with some new characters who quickly begin to charmKatie has no experience in running a business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there's always her very helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, William, to lend a hand…
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099539934</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1846976596
 
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}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Dean Koontz
|author=Asa Jones
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|title=The Bad Weather Friend
|title=The Illustrated Mind of Mike Reeves
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|rating=4.5
|rating=3.5
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|genre=Paranormal
|genre=Fantasy
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|summary=Benny is having a terrifically bad dayHe loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and his house gets trashedOh, and someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to his home, and it's possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that has trashed his house!  The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all this bad luckHe is a nice personA really nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to his house is a new friend, a bad weather friend called Spike, who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person.  Spike is going to take care of Benny, and will certainly take care of Benny's enemies, if he, Benny, and Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are.
|summary=Mike Reeves doesn't have his troubles to seekHis wife was brutally raped some four or five years ago and whilst she might seem to be recovered she cannot stand to be touched by a man – any man, Mike includedQuite suddenly Mike was alone, in every way – until he found himself drawn to the darker arts and began to dabble in Tarot, the Runes and I Ching.  He's guided by two spiritsSean is a wise and benevolent older man and Debbie, well she… isn'tShe's the one who satisfies Mike's sexual needs. If that's all sounding rather good, then hesitate a moment, for with the good comes the bad and the bad is in the form of Tony a (very) real-life gangster who's been doing his own dabbling in the spirit world.  When their worlds clash Mike has a problem which could well be more than he can handle.
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|isbn=1662500491
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>160693905X</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Katherine Howe
|author=Margaret Forster
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|title=A True Account
|title=Diary of an Ordinary Woman
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=After reading the introduction, I couldn't help but sneak a sly read at the author's note right at the end of the novelI don't usually do this.  I'm glad I did as the information is both surprising and revelatory.  Back to the beginning and Chapter 1 ..We meet the 13 year old Millicent in 1914.  By her written statements and recorded mannerisms, we see that she's a girl who knows her own mind.  For example, she thinks writing in her diary every single day could be dull and boring so she's made a golden rule that she's only going to write something down when she feels like it.  Some may call her precocious but I liked Millicent right from the start.  Courtesy of her diary we find out that she's part of a large and boisterous family.  She doesn't appreciate all the noise and chatter from her siblings.  She craves peace and quiet to think and to read. She's a prolific reader.  She also believes that she's smart and clever and wants to 'do' something with her life when she grows up.  She's not sure what exactly but she certainly doesn't want to be a mere housewife and mother.
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|summary=Hannah Masury is living in Boston, having been sent to live with a family who run an inn, and being made to work there from a young ageWhen she hears there is to be a hanging of some pirates in the town, she decides to go and watchEnthralled and horrified in equal measure, Hannah finds herself embroiled in a young boy's death at the hands of two vicious pirates.  She hides away, so that they don't find and kill her too, and then to escape them completely she runs away to sea, dressing as a boy and joining the notorious Ned Low's pirate ship as a cabin boy.  She soon finds herself in the thick of things when there is a mutiny on board, and from there we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of life on the ocean waves.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099449285</amazonuk>
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|isbn=0861547438
 
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}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1471180158
|author=Matt Dunn
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|title=Maybe Tomorrow
|title=The Accidental Proposal
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|author=Penny Parkes
|rating=3.5
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|rating=4.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Edward Middleton seems like a pretty decent guy. He always stops to buy a Big Issues from Billy, a local homeless man and he takes his elderly widowed neighbour shopping once a week. These are some of the reasons why his girlfriend, Sam, loves him so much. One night, after a friend's wedding, Sam asks Ed if he would also like to get married to which Ed enthusiastically replies 'yes'. However, the following morning, whilst nursing his hangover, he cannot work out if it was a hypothetical question or an actual proposal. His best mate Dan is no help at all and is quite incredulous that anyone should ever want to marry Ed.
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|summary=Jamie Matson works in an upper-class grocery store, for a man who's a control freak with all the subtlety of a half brick. Jamie's son, Bo, 'has his problems'. He's asthmatic and the more you read, the more you'll suspect that he's on the autistic spectrum.  Sometimes Jamie needs to take time off at short notice - she's a frequent flier in the local A&E and sometimes Bo's not fit enough to go to school. Missed shifts or the need to be away on time to pick Bo up from school are occasions when Jamie can be controlled and put in the wrong.  It was going to come to a head.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847395244</amazonuk>
 
 
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}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=B0CKD1L5JL
|author=William Styron
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|title=Radio Free Olympia
|title=The Suicide Run
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|author=Jeffrey Dunn
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Short Stories
 
|summary=A WW2 naval soldier, guarding a prison island for those found guilty at courtmartials, is forced to wonder if he is winning his own battles against those arriving and leaving.  A soldier remembers calming memories, and those causing tension, as he rests up before action.  And for a highly-charged young man, there may be too much risk to be found in his high-octane downtime.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099532220</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Molly Carr
 
|title=The Sign of Fear
 
|rating=3
 
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Meet Mary Watson - a distant second to John Watson, who of course was a distant second to Sherlock Holmes. Fed up with staying at home while her new husband spends too much time at 221b Baker Street, or away with Holmes sleuthing, she gets to dabble her own feet in the underworld waters when a certain Professor Moriarty comes calling.
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|summary= Petr is an orphan. Rescued by the strange, reclusive Bear, he is brought up far from bustling cities and busy human society, in the forests of Washington's Olympic Peninsula.  After Bear dies and a brief sojourn in human company, and armed with only a pirate radio transmitter, Petr goes on a journey through the forest, broadcasting the strange, wild and rarely heard voices he encounters.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907685006</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Sarah Marsh
|author=Jon Stephen Fink
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|title=A Sign of Her Own
|title=A Storm In The Blood
 
 
|rating=3.5
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=''A Storm In The Blood'' is based on a true story involving the police force and the government of the day trying to suppress racial tensions in early 20th century LondonIt has resonance for our modern times as we grapple with similar situations and problems.
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|summary=After a bout of scarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing.  Suddenly plunged into a world of silence, everything about her life changes.  Living in a time when the use of sign language was seen as something only savages do, Ellen is sent to a school where she is taught to lip read, but physically restrained from signing.  From here, she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the deaf and using a system called Visible SpeechAt the same time, Bell is working on other inventions and ideas, and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a complicated tangle of espionage.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0956544517</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1035401614
 
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{{Frontpage
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|isbn=B0BC3YTCMR
 +
|title=Good Girls Die
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|author=Ayura Ayira
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|rating=4.5
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|genre=General Fiction
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|summary=''This story is not for everyone.''
  
{{newreview
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Lavender Daniels was three weeks short of her fifteenth birthday when The Incident happened.  She was a very bright student, a bit too nerdy if truth be told, and suffered from vitiligo - people were afraid to hug her in case it's contagious.  It's not easy being a black girl whose skin is 84% whiteShe had a crush on seventeen-year-old Reggie Anderson but never thought he would notice her.  Then he did: Lavender was very good at math and Reggie asked if she would tutor him.  She readily agreed: tutoring was something she gladly did at church: this was just an extension.  She went to his house and he raped her.  In shock, she even allowed him to give her a lift home.
|author=Allegra Goodman
 
|title=The Cookbook Collector
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=''The Cookbook Collector'' is all about emotionsConcentrating on two, young, American women who are vastly different in many areas of their lives and also on their outlook on life, Goodman digs deeper to find out what makes them tick - what makes them get up in the morning.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848875398</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Craig Smith
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|isbn=1472263936
|title=Cold Rain
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|title=The Figurine
|rating=4
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|author=Victoria Hislop
 +
|rating=5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Life was pretty good for Dr David AlboHe'd just had fifteen months away from his job as an associate professor of English at a university in the mid-western USAHe lived on a plantation-style farmhouse with a beautiful and intelligent wife and a step-daughter who adored him.  He was even going back to work in the expectation that he might well be offered a full professorship in the not-too-distant future and just to put the icing on the cake he's been clear of alcohol for two years.  Yes; life was very good.
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|summary=It was in 1968 that Helena McCloud made her first trip to GreeceShe was alone: her mother, Greek by birth, had left the family home and refused to return, but Mary and Hamish (Helena's parents) felt that it would be a pity if Helena grew up without knowing her grandparents or understanding her Greek heritage.  Her trip to the family apartment in up-market Kolonaki would be the first of several annual visitsShe grew to love her grandmother and the family's maid, Dina, but was wary - and frightened - of her grandfather, retired general Stamatis Papagiannis.  He was proud of his close connections to the Junta and expected his family to uphold his values but saw no reason to accommodate them.  His prejudices included Helena's red hair and green eyes - inherited from her father's Scottish ancestors.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>190580234X</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Dean Koontz
|author=Anna Gavalda
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|title=After Death
|title=Consolation
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|rating=3
|rating=4.5
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|genre=General Fiction
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|summary= Michael Mace, Head of Security, at a top secret biological research facility, is among 55 people who die when a virus is released in a bio-hazard accident.  Finding himself in a makeshift mortuary, covered in plastic, he has a sense that something very, very bad has happened to him – and only him – as he sits up and looks around at the shrouded bodies of his dead friends and former colleagues.  As he recovers his senses, he realises that there is something different about him; he can ''feel'' everything.  ''Everything''.  Michael isn't ''Michael'' anymore.
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|isbn=1662500467
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{{Frontpage
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|isbn=B0BVDC2VWH
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|title=The Grave Listeners
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|author=William Frank
 +
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=We meet Charles, the main character right at the start. And straight away, it's no secret that, as a middle-aged professional (he's an architect and a successful one at that) he's jaded. Been-there, done-that and got-the-bloody-tee-shirt just about sums him up pretty well.  He's acquired (somehow) a beautiful, witty and clever partner and also a step-daughter whom he adores. As the story deepens, I soon acknowledged that the step-daughter seems to be about the only true love in his life.  He's luke-warm about the rest of his family and that includes his partner and his ageing parents.  Is this man going through some mid-life crisis, would be an obvious question to ask.
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|summary=The village is isolated and poor. It's surrounded by a Witching Forest. And the villagers subsist largely by farming Uphegia plants - its bread-like fruit provides nutrition and its blossom provides herbal medicines. The black wood of the forest provides heat and warmth, roofs on homes, and even gallows, if needed. The fear of being buried alive is an existential superstition in the village and that is the reason Volushka, a drunken, self-indulgent, lazy lout of a man is tolerated.  
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099531925</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{newreview
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{{Frontpage
|author=Sam Hawken
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|isbn=B0BYF82CXT
|title=The Dead Women of Juarez
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|title=Semi-Detached
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|author=Deborah Stone
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=Crime
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|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Although the story related here is a work of fiction, the situation is based on fact. The Mexican border city of Juárez has a shocking problem with female homicides (usually young and invariably pretty). Official statistics put the number of murders at 400 since 1993 while, we are told, residents believe that the true number of disappeared women is closer to 5000. But attention to this problem is diverted by drug crime, although the two may not be entirely unrelated. Anything that raises public awareness of this terrible situation, such as Hawken's book, is to be encouraged.
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|summary=''Bill and Amanda are living in a semi-detached house, stuck in a depressing rut of boredom and disappointment, when Terry and Fiona – glamorous, successful and very much in love – move in next door. Despite their different outlooks on life, the couples befriend each other and life appears to improve for both pairs. But all is not what it seems, and their increasingly interconnected relationships are fated for tragedy.''
 
 
So much for the fact, what about the fiction?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184668773X</amazonuk>
 
 
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}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Shalini Boland
|author=Pamela Klaffke
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|title=The Silent Bride
|title=Snapped
 
 
|rating=3
 
|rating=3
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=They say that a good idea is to write about what you knowWell, Klaffke seems to have heeded that piece of advice.  She writes here about a fictional fashion writer called Sara B (note the pretentious second capital letter) who is the central character.  And although Sara B is now in her middle years, she's still acting like a teenagerShe's got the younger boyfriend/lover, got the latest fashion look which she can deftly put her stamp on, got the invites to the best parties in the best venues with the must-be-seen-with minor celebrities.  But - is she happy?  I know, it seems a silly question, but is it?
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|summary= Alice and Seth are a match made in heavenHe is everything she has been searching for; handsome, accomplished, clever, funny; total and utter husband-material.  She is all he could possibly want in a wife; beautiful, successful, confident… and so the inevitable proposal is eagerly accepted by Alice and the wedding is planned and setWhen the much-anticipated day arrives, Alice is walked down the aisle by her father, beaming with pride and excitement as she surveys the congregation – their friends assembled to celebrate this joyful day and when Seth turns to face his approaching bride, Alice's world implodes because she has absolutely no idea who the man at the altar is, who is waiting for her to become his wife.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0778304337</amazonuk>
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|isbn=1662507089
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Diane Chamberlain
 
|title=Breaking the Silence
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=As I've reviewed several of Chamberlain's previous books and enjoyed them, I was looking forward to getting stuck in to this one.  We meet the central character; wife and mother to five-year-old Emma, Laura.  She's distraught.  Her father (Emma's grandfather) has just passed away but his dying wish has really upset Laura.  It's a strange request and she doesn't know what to make of it.  She confides in her husband thinking that two heads are better than one.  He's a brilliant academic and could give some much-needed advice.  But he doesn't.  In fact, he behaves like a five-year-old himself and almost has a tantrum.  Odd.  Now poor Laura's doubly confused, upset and doesn't know how to handle her grief.  Tough times.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0778304140</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=1787636003
|author=Lola Shoneyin
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|title=The Girls of Summer
|title=The Secret Lives of Baba Segi's Wives
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|author=Katie Bishop
 
|rating=5
 
|rating=5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=The Secret Lives of Baba Segi's Wives is one of those books that you read with a smile on your face. It's full of gloriously unsavoury characters caught in a terrible web of deceit. We are promised 'four women, one husband and a devastating secret' and it delivers on all three counts. Sure the secret is quite well signposted and Shoneyin doesn't really make much of an effort to divert the reader from putting two and two together, although it takes wife number four, Bolanle, an inordinate amount of time for the penny to drop, but it's not about discovering the deception - it's about the glorious journey of how things unfold.
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|summary=It was the summer when Rachel Evans turned eighteen that she and Caroline went backpacking around Greece and arrived on the island. Rachel wasn't exactly innocent but she was, perhaps, naive, so when thirty-four-year-old Alistair Wright started to take an interest in her, she was flattered rather than wary.  It was quite a while before he made any sort of physical approach to her and by that time she was obsessed by him.  Alistair worked for Henry Taylor, looking after his interests on the island and in particular in the bar where all the girls either worked or partied.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846687497</amazonuk>
 
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Amanda Craig
|author=Cornelius Medvei
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|title=Three Graces
|title=Caroline: A Mystery
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|rating=4.5
|rating=4
 
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Meet Mr Shaw. He's an insurance worker who takes his wife and son off on their annual vacation one year, and finds himself indulging in a surprisingly platonic holiday romance. The subject of his infatuation, Caroline, has eyes, ears, hair and more that easily combine with Mr Shaw's fondness for classical Persian love poetry.  At the end of the holiday he lets his wife and son depart while he takes a further week off to walk all the way home with Caroline.  Who is, as it happens, a donkey.
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|summary= Few styles of contemporary fiction interest me like the state-of-the-nation novel. There's something so utterly compelling about any writer who can catch hold of the atmosphere of the day and capture it, crafting an image of the country as it stands in one particular moment. To say that Amanda Craig is skilled at doing this would be embarrassingly inadequate: she's practically synonymous with the genre of contemporary social fiction at this point. She has such a gift for weaving the ongoing issues of the day into the lives of her characters in a way that feels natural and lived-in, never making them ciphers for social commentary but instead fully realised people, grappling with issues far larger than themselves.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846553881</amazonuk>
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|isbn= 140871468X
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|isbn=152915118X
|author=Steve Martin
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|title=Pineapple Street
|title=An Object of Beauty
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|author=Jenny Jackson
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Leave aside the title of the book for a minute, the book itself is also 'an object of beauty' with its striking front cover and primary colours artfully arrangedAnd then I turned the book over and said to myself, oh, it's ''that'' Steve MartinI knew he was - and is - a very funny actor but I didn't know that he was also a writerSo, before I'd even opened the book I was thinking - will he be as good a writer as he is an actorI was about to find out ...
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|summary=''Pineapple Street'' is the story of three women: Sasha, Darley and GeorgianaDarley and George are sisters and Sasha is married to their brother Cord.  They're Stocktons, only Sasha isn't a Stockton by birth so she isn't readily accepted into the tribe.  The problem's exacerbated when the clan matriarch, Tilda, asks Cord and Sasha if they'd like to move into the Pineapple Street propertyTilda and Chip have renovated and downsized to another property, a street or so away, which they own.  They won't need any of the furniture from Pineapple Street, so Sasha and Cord can move straight inNominally, they had a choice but that wasn't the realityDarley and Georgiana start to call Sasha 'the gold digger'.   She's living in ''their'' family home. They use it so often that they abbreviate it to 'the GD'.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0297863290</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
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{{Frontpage
{{newreview
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|author=Emily Critchley
|author=Tom Campbell
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|title=One Puzzling Afternoon
|title=Fold
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
|genre=General Fiction
+
|genre=Crime
|summary=Five men in Reading circulate their monthly poker evenings around their respective housesNone of them like all the others, none of them seem to completely like the game, but they're more-or-less happy with the habitIt's the way the five different personalities approach the evenings that we are concerned with, and enjoy principally, especially when the poorest player, Nick, decides to clash with his polar opposite, Doug.  And what might happen if a non-playing character were to enter things, and make them even feistier?
+
|summary=84 year old Edie has lived in the same small town for almost her whole life, but now she is facing a move as her son wants to move to another house and bring Edie to live with his family, as Edie is starting to lose her memoryHowever, Edie is tormented by the memory of her childhood friend, Lucy, who went missing over 60 years ago, and the worry that there was a secret she was keeping for Lucy that somehow might be the thing that reveals the truth of what happened all that time agoAfter 'seeing' Lucy in the high street, just as she was the last time she saw her, she starts to find pockets of memories coming back to her.  And yet as she remembers the past, she is forgetting more and more in her day to day life.  Will she uncover the truth about Lucy's disappearance before her move, and before her memories are gone forever?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408807602</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=1804181250
 
}}
 
}}
 +
{{Frontpage
 +
|author=Madelaine Lucas
 +
|title=Thirst for Salt
 +
|rating=5
 +
|genre=Literary Fiction
 +
|summary= ''Love, I'd read, was supposed to be a light and weightless feeling, but I had always longed for gravity''
  
{{newreview
+
Told from a retrospective view, a young woman unravels the year-long relationship that once defined her. Overlaid with later wisdom, the narrator relives the affair with a man twenty years her senior from its inception – the summer after finishing university – to its sorrowful end the summer after. Set against the backdrop of an isolated Australian coastal town ''Thirst for Salt'' details the 24-year-old narrator's deepening relationship with her older lover, depicting its all-consuming nature, how it changed her perspective on both romantic and familial relationships and how it altered her irrevocably.
|author=Francois Lelord
+
|isbn=0861546490
|title=Hector and the Secrets of Love
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=Professor Cormorant has gone AWOL.  Tasked with developing drugs to cure a lot of ills, by making us fall in love, he has fled with his secrets, his prototypes, and a few samples that may or may not be dangerous. It is down to Hector, a psychiatrist, to chase him down, work out where Cormorant is in his researches, and if possible help bring the trade secrets back to the company his girlfriend, and now himself, works for.  With the exotic far East his destination, a partner left behind, and time on his hand to muse on the subject of love, will Hector find more than just a bunch of chemicals in a syringe?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906040338</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=0008506337
|author=Edward Wright
+
|title=The Garnett Girls
|title=From Blood
+
|author=Georgina Moore
|rating=4
+
|rating=5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=While I'm not mad about the title, the book's cover is atmospherically good - it says to the reader 'please pick me up and read me.' So I did. The book opens in 1960s America with the Prologue.  A bunch of radical thinkers are angryThey turn this pent-up anger into a well-oiled, well-ordered act of violenceLives are lostBut the perpetrators are clever and most of them escape justiceThey do what many around the world have done before them; they go underground.  But several key members are still at large ...
+
|summary=The love affair between Margo Garnett and poet Richard O'Leary was all-consuming, apparently on both sides.  Margo was just sixteen when they fell in love.  Richard was twenty-one and described by Margo's mother as 'an older man'.  Her parents worried that Richard's influence would take her away from what they felt she could achieve - going to Oxford and having a glittering careerIn the event, they eloped and Richard took her away from the Isle of WightMargo did go to Oxford and went on to become a well-respected journalistThe couple had three children: Rachel, Imogen and SashaLife was lived in London and holidays were spent at Sandcove, the family home on the Isle of WightEven then the doubts about Richard's drinking were never far from Margo's mind: ''she would never be able to leave him in charge''.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0752891774</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
+
Then Richard left them.
|author=David Lindsley
 
|title=The Darkfall Switch
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=The book opens on a sultry, hot summer's day in central London.  Imagine the stifling heat is the subliminal message here, especially for those passengers on the underground - ' ... as if they were all joined in some macabre dance as the train rattled along the tunnel.  Everybody pressed against others.'  Suddenly there's a problem with the infrastructure.  A big problem.  As the experts frantically work behind the scenes to get London moving again - the unthinkable happens.  People lose their lives in what appears to be a power cut.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>070909146X</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
  
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Alan Lorber
+
|isbn=1914585402
|title=Benny Allen Was A Star: A New York Music Story
+
|title=Dashboard Elvis is Dead
|rating=3
+
|author=David F Ross
 +
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Alan Lorber has written a fictional and I suspect a semi autobiographical account of his years as a top music arranger in the 1950's and early 1960's, a period of huge change in the music industry culminating with the breakthrough of the Beatles in America. Rather than simply writing a factual narrative of his involvement during this period he decided to tell the story of the fictional Benny Allen, a classically trained musician who almost by accident gets involved in the music publishing business and then goes on to produce some hugely successful orchestrations on many of the top hit records of the time.
+
|summary=I reviewed David F Ross's book [[There's Only One Danny Garvey by David F Ross|There's Only One Danny Garvey]] a couple of years back and remember being absolutely floored by how powerful and affecting it was. It was a gripping, emotionally wounding read, and rereading my review of it my main takeaway was that I might not have lavished enough praise on it.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>B0041VXCTA</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Lucy Ashe
|author=Deborah Harkness
+
|title=Clara and Olivia
|title=A Discovery of Witches
 
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
|genre=Fantasy
 
|summary=The back cover is full of praise for this debut novel which has been involved in a publishing 'tussle', no less.  Impressive.  I was looking forward to reading what all the fuss was about.  The title is terrific too.  But was the book a terrific read?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755374029</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Elfriede Jelinek
 
|title=The Piano Teacher
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=Literary Fiction
 
|summary=Erika is a single woman in her thirties, who, despite the best efforts of her mother, did not succeed as a concert musician, but instead works as a teacher at the Vienna Conservatory.  I say best efforts, I mean outright pressure.  Erika and her mother make for an unusual relationship - the older relying on the glory, company and complete obedience of the younger, the daughter sharing a bed with her mother even at this stage of her life.  All this is until a young student at the school decides he will be a younger lover for Erika, and forces his will into the household.  But who, should such a relationship actually form, is going to be the power-maker?
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846687373</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Maria Angels Anglada
 
|title=The Auschwitz Violin
 
|rating=4
 
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=In Poland in the early 1990s, a violin sings. The maestro who owns it produces such a music from it, people are forced to take note. They'd be even more amazed if she could bring herself to state exactly how the instrument came to be. For this was the work of Daniel, suffering in a subsidiary camp to Auschwitz-Birkenau. Stumbles, chances, half-lies, all conspire to allow Daniel to take time off his enforced labour and engage in his real-world career. But is there a price to pay in doing something you love, just for a man you can only hate?
+
|summary=The year is 1933. The place? Sadler's Wells. Ballerinas Clara and Olivia are sisters, twins no less. Identical on the outside but not, we learn, on the inside. And not on stage, either. Because there's a lot that builds a dancer. Some things that can be taught or learnt – discipline, attention to detail – and some things, that ''je ne sais quoi'', that don't come from the classroom. A stage presence, a charm, a ''joie de vivre''. The difference between a hard-worker, and a star.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849016437</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0861544080
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Heather Fawcett
|author=Bethan Darwin
+
|title=Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries
|title=Two Times Twenty
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=You can tell from the beginning of this novel that you're in WalesThe young Anna (as we travel back in time) is meeting what will be long-term friends, Bob and JaneWe find Anna rather proudly introducing her two young sons and Bob butting in with 'Duw, good-sized boys for their age ... Make good rugby players one day.' But the Welsh location and all things Welsh is given a subtle touch.
+
|summary=Emily Wilde is an expert academic scholar on faerie lore, and she has travelled extensively, and researched meticulously, to write her life's work, the very first encyclopaedia of faeries.  Whilst she is brilliant at research and speaking to faeries, she is not so good with peopleSo when she finds herself far, far North in the small village of Hrafvsnik, having somehow offended the village matriarch, she is not sure what she has done, nor how to redeem herself and put her final investigations for her book back on the right trackEnter Wendell Bambleby, her dashingly handsome and insufferable rival who arrives unexpectedly, all charm and delight, much to Emily's frustration.  But why is he here?  What does he want?  And what exactly is going on with the faerie folk around Hravsnik?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>190678423X</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=0356519120
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|isbn=1398515388
|author=Adrian Dawson
+
|title=The Boy and the Dog
|title=CODEX
+
|author=Seishu Hase and Alison Watts (translator)
 
|rating=4.5
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=When I read the resume on the back cover I immediately thought that it was going to be one of those high-octane, action every second paragraph, type of thrillersAll action and perhaps very little substanceI was happily proved wrongAnd very early on in the novel, as well, which was good.
+
|summary=First of all, it was the earthquake, deep in the ocean floor, which created the tsunami and this, in turn, caused the nuclear meltdownThe result was complete and utter devastationThe deaths were uncountable, and the loss of livelihoods was widespreadThe fact that many pets were separated from their owners came far down the list of priorities but - six months after the tsunami - Kazumasa Nakagaki discovered a dog outside a convenience store.  He wasn't a dog person but the convenience store owner's comment that he would call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to open his car door and Tamon the dog jumped in.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0956577008</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
  
{{newreview
+
{{Frontpage
|author=Peter Durantine
+
|author=Christopher Bowden
|title=The Chocolate Assassin
+
|title=Mr Magenta
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=In the final days of the Second World War as the allied guns came ever closer a young German was sent on a secret mission to America. He was only in his late teens but still resisted telling anyone, including the U-boat captain who took him across the Atlantic, about the nature of his mission.  Fifty five years later the U-boat captain, Eric Hoest, long settled in the States, was murdered at his beach home.  Samuel Grey, police detective and part-time student was called in to investigate the murder.  The local police chief thought that the most likely murderer was the neighbour who had reported the crime, but Grey suspected that the truth was hidden somewhere in Hoest's background.
+
|summary= Christopher Bowden's latest novel is a patient untangling of a seemingly ordinary woman's life, carried out by her nephew after she has died. The aunt who always provided a safe harbour and a little bit of indulgence to a young nephew had had a much more interesting life than that nephew Stephen had ever realised and it seems to him an obligation to find it all out.  
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1451579527</amazonuk>
+
|isbn= B0B6Z9VJDW
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Jennifer Mason
|author=Sheila O'Flanagan
+
|title=Partitions of Unity
|title=A Season to Remember
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=We first meet the Lodge owners, a likable couple.  They find running their upmarket country house type hotel both exhilarating and exhausting.  The novel is bang up to date so O'Flanagan gets in the whole recession/banker-bashing thing early on.  As the festive season looms, the unthinkable has happened. Empty rooms.  They're not used to empty rooms, at any time of the year. Normally the Lodge is a full house. But then a slow and steady trickle starts as our characters book in - and the story starts proper, so to speak.
+
|summary= Here at Bookbag Towers, we first met Elizabeth Cromwell, dominatrix and unintentional detective in [[Preposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery by Jennifer Mason|Preposterous]], when she investigated and unravelled a series of disappearances. In ''Partitions of Unity'', she sets her mind to solving a murder...
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755375157</amazonuk>
+
|isbn=B09LQR9FRF
 
}}
 
}}
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Will Carver
|author=Jack Everett and David Coles
+
|title=The Daves Next Door
|title=Last Mission: the last hours of the Third Reich
+
|rating=4
|rating=3.5
 
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=We first meet a couple of characters living in the United States.  A husband and wife and a relation of theirs called Paul. On the surface, they appear to be enjoying happy, normal lives.  But all is not what is seems.  We soon find out that the husband, Carl has some secrets.  Pretty big ones.  He keeps a picture of Adolph Hitler on display - somewhere - in his home, for example.  Links with Germany and his past life are often talked about, or rather whispered about, with a handful of trusted 'acquaintances' over a beer or two.
+
|summary= Five strangers come together in one moment as a suicide bomber prepares to detonate his vest on a London tube line. As their fates overlap, the story is told in backwards order, leading up to the fateful moment.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095653421X</amazonuk>
+
|isbn= 1914585186
}}
+
}}  
 
+
{{Frontpage
{{newreview
+
|author=Jennifer Mason
|author=Mary E Martin
+
|title=Preposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery
|title=The Drawing Lesson: The First in the Trilogy of Remembrance
 
 
|rating=4
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|genre=General Fiction
|summary=Alexander Wainwright is the UK's premier artist.  He's just won the Turner with ''The Hay Wagon'' – a painting with a luminous, moonlit landscape.  He should be at the peak of his powers, but he's about to lose his muse and, more worryingly, there seems to be something wrong with his sight and the year to come is going to be traumatic. The story of it is told by his friend, art dealer Jamie Helmsworth, who has pieced together what he knows, what he's heard – and used a little artistic licence to fill in the gaps.  It's a most unusual story which will take you deep into the world of artists and writers.
+
|summary=''A struggling poetry zine, a mom-and-pop mobile diner in the Northern California redwoods, a 400-meter hurdler who just missed the 2004 Olympics, a women's track coach with a yen for bullwhips, a billionaire with a state-of-the-art S&M dungeon, a man serving a life sentence in Alabama, an enigmatic signature, K(s, x), on a cheap oil painting, an erotic art dealer in Georgia...''
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1450229360</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Cathleen Schine
 
|title=The Three Weissmanns of Westport
 
|rating=3.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=The novel begins with Joseph Weissmann, or Josie as he is known, deciding at the age of 78 that he no longer wants to be married to Betty after 48 years together.  In an attempt to save Betty's feelings he cites irreconcilable differences, but the truth is he has fallen head over heels in love. Betty is devastated, her life in tatters, with even the beautiful Central Park apartment she adores soon lost to her.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849015716</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
  
{{newreview
+
This is just a sample of the cast of characters and settings in Preposterous. As you can see, some keeping up will be required! The basic premise of this mystery story goes like this...
|author=John Irving
+
|isbn=B09STS96HS
|title=Last Night in Twisted River
 
|rating=4.5
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=We start in 1954, in the middle of nowhere, in a log-cutters' encampment.  The cook lives alone with his twelve year old son, in some kind of comfort - a decent job, familiarity with the harsh surroundings and the hardened people inhabiting it.  But a pair of tragedies - one involving a fatal work accident with a young teenager new to the job, force the pair to flee.  They leave behind a red herring that they hope will force the local brutal policeman to get the wrong impression, and a best friend in the shape of Ketchum, the most hardened logger in the camp as a kind of safety-net, but their destiny, spread over the next few generations, will prove to still be populated with tragedy, romance, despair - and the constant look over their shoulder to the tiny settlement of Twisted River.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0552776572</amazonuk>
 
 
}}
 
}}
  
{{newreview
+
Move on to [[Newest Graphic Novels Reviews]]
|author=Tony Bayliss
 
|title=Past Continuous
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=The author's note tells the reader that this book 'was inspired by the suicide of the author's son.'
 
 
Chapter 1 opens with the reader being in no doubt that the schoolboy Matthew has a knack with computers.  He's a bit of a whiz-kid.  He's also shy and tongue-tied which makes him a bit of a loner as well.  He stands out at school for all the wrong reasons but he's coping with it - just.  And early on in the book we meet Sophie.  She's a big part of this book.  She's around Matthew's age.  She is bright and clever.  Her adoptive parents would probably say that she's too clever for her own good.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1907230173</amazonuk>
 
}}
 
 
 
{{newreview
 
|author=Sam Hayes
 
|title=Someone Else's Son
 
|rating=4
 
|genre=General Fiction
 
|summary=The book opens with Carrie Kent.  Successful television presenter and mother of teenager, Max.  Ms Kent immediately comes across as hard-headed, business-like, aloof and rather distant but that's the whole point, of course.  Very good at her day job.  But as a mother?  Her television show is a reality programme, dealing with well, basically the dregs of society:  single, young mums, drug addicts etc.  Carrie knows that these people keep her in designer shoes and bags but she keeps them at arm's length.  She wouldn't want to catch something.  Carrie sails through her life with a self-satisfied smile on her face.  You can just tell.
 
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0755349873</amazonuk>
 
}}
 

Revision as of 13:52, 8 May 2024

1846976537.jpg

Review of

Beyond Summerland by Jenny Lecoat

4star.jpg General Fiction

Jean lives on Jersey with her mother where they are celebrating the end of the occupation. During the war, Jean's father was arrested for listening to a banned radio and soldiers took him away one night, leaving Jean and her mother waiting for years for news of him. As the British finally free the Channel islands from the Nazis, and the war is finally over, their hopes rise that they will finally learn what became of him. But will the truth come as a relief, or will it raise further questions around what else happened during the war? Who was the informer who told the Nazis about the radio? And what other secrets have been kept throughout the occupation? Full Review

0861546873.jpg

Review of

Allow Me to Introduce Myself by Onyi Nwabineli

4.5star.jpg General Fiction

Anuri spent her childhood on display to the world, thanks to her step-mother Ophelia's increasingly popular presence on social media, where she posted every step of Anuri's childhood for sponsorships and influencer deals and, basically, monetary gain. Now Anuri is in her twenties and she is slowly trying to regain her confidence and to get her life back, suing her step-mother to take down the content about her. Anuri is battling alcoholism, failing to start her PhD, undergoing therapy and secretly abusing people online and receiving money from them for doing so. Most importantly, she is desperately worried about her little sister, who is the new focus of Ophelia's online empire. Can she save her sister, and perhaps herself and her relationship with her father at the same time? Full Review

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Review of

The List of Suspicious Things by Jennie Godfrey

5star.jpg General Fiction

It's 1979 and Margaret Thatcher is Prime Minister. (A woman? I mean, honestly...) She's not what's worrying Miv's family, though. Women have been disappearing. Well, they've been murdered, but to have 'disappeared' doesn't sound quite so frightening. Miv's upset because she's overheard that her father wants to move the family 'Down South'. When you're from Yorkshire, Down South is a frightening, foreign place, best avoided. For Miv, the move would mean leaving her best friend, Sharon, and she'll do anything to prevent that. She's not worried about the dangers or that her Mum's stopped talking - to anyone. Full Review

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Review of

Diva by Daisy Goodwin

4.5star.jpg General Fiction

We tend to think of Maria Callas as Greek, but she was born to Greek parents in Manhattan, New York, in December 1923 and only moved to Athens when she was thirteen. Her original surname was Kalogeropoulos but her father changed it to 'Callas' to make it more manageable in the States. When she was back in Athens - supposedly so that she could get appropriate training for her voice - she was raised under the Nazi occupation by a mother who mercilessly exploited her and made no secret of her preference for her elder sister, Jackie. Full Review

1846976596.jpg

Review of

The Perfect Passion Company by Alexander McCall Smith

4.5star.jpg General Fiction

The Perfect Passion Company is a dating agency in Edinburgh, run by Ness and operating as an alternative to all the online apps in providing a more personal, tailored service. Ness has asked her younger cousin Katie if she could come and look after the business, as Ness is planning to take a trip to Canada to get away for a while. Katie is coming out of a break up with a bad boyfriend, and so jumps at the chance to come home to Edinburgh. And so begins this new story from Alexander McCall Smith, bringing us to an Edinburgh we already love, thanks to 44 Scotland Street and the Isabel Dalhousie novels, but with some new characters who quickly begin to charm. Katie has no experience in running a business, or in match-making, but Ness has full confidence in her abilities, and there's always her very helpful (and rather handsome) neighbour, William, to lend a hand… Full Review

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Review of

The Bad Weather Friend by Dean Koontz

4.5star.jpg Paranormal

Benny is having a terrifically bad day. He loses his job, he loses his fiancee, and his house gets trashed. Oh, and someone has delivered a really weird, disturbing coffin-sized object to his home, and it's possible that whoever or whatever was inside is the thing that has trashed his house! The thing is, Benny is the very last person to deserve all this bad luck. He is a nice person. A really nice person. So fortunately for Benny it turns out that the delivery to his house is a new friend, a bad weather friend called Spike, who has been sent to help him since Benny is clearly under attack from nefarious forces for being a good person. Spike is going to take care of Benny, and will certainly take care of Benny's enemies, if he, Benny, and Harper (a waitress slash Private Investigator who finds herself roped into Benny's wild adventure) can figure out who exactly they are. Full Review

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Review of

A True Account by Katherine Howe

4.5star.jpg General Fiction

Hannah Masury is living in Boston, having been sent to live with a family who run an inn, and being made to work there from a young age. When she hears there is to be a hanging of some pirates in the town, she decides to go and watch. Enthralled and horrified in equal measure, Hannah finds herself embroiled in a young boy's death at the hands of two vicious pirates. She hides away, so that they don't find and kill her too, and then to escape them completely she runs away to sea, dressing as a boy and joining the notorious Ned Low's pirate ship as a cabin boy. She soon finds herself in the thick of things when there is a mutiny on board, and from there we are caught up in her rip roaring tale of life on the ocean waves. Full Review

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Review of

Maybe Tomorrow by Penny Parkes

4.5star.jpg General Fiction

Jamie Matson works in an upper-class grocery store, for a man who's a control freak with all the subtlety of a half brick. Jamie's son, Bo, 'has his problems'. He's asthmatic and the more you read, the more you'll suspect that he's on the autistic spectrum. Sometimes Jamie needs to take time off at short notice - she's a frequent flier in the local A&E and sometimes Bo's not fit enough to go to school. Missed shifts or the need to be away on time to pick Bo up from school are occasions when Jamie can be controlled and put in the wrong. It was going to come to a head. Full Review

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Review of

Radio Free Olympia by Jeffrey Dunn

4star.jpg General Fiction

Petr is an orphan. Rescued by the strange, reclusive Bear, he is brought up far from bustling cities and busy human society, in the forests of Washington's Olympic Peninsula. After Bear dies and a brief sojourn in human company, and armed with only a pirate radio transmitter, Petr goes on a journey through the forest, broadcasting the strange, wild and rarely heard voices he encounters. Full Review

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Review of

A Sign of Her Own by Sarah Marsh

3.5star.jpg General Fiction

After a bout of scarlet fever as a child, Ellen Lark loses her hearing. Suddenly plunged into a world of silence, everything about her life changes. Living in a time when the use of sign language was seen as something only savages do, Ellen is sent to a school where she is taught to lip read, but physically restrained from signing. From here, she ends up in another school studying under Alexander Graham Bell who has been teaching the deaf and using a system called Visible Speech. At the same time, Bell is working on other inventions and ideas, and Ellen finds herself unwittingly caught up in a complicated tangle of espionage. Full Review

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Review of

Good Girls Die by Ayura Ayira

4.5star.jpg General Fiction

This story is not for everyone.

Lavender Daniels was three weeks short of her fifteenth birthday when The Incident happened. She was a very bright student, a bit too nerdy if truth be told, and suffered from vitiligo - people were afraid to hug her in case it's contagious. It's not easy being a black girl whose skin is 84% white. She had a crush on seventeen-year-old Reggie Anderson but never thought he would notice her. Then he did: Lavender was very good at math and Reggie asked if she would tutor him. She readily agreed: tutoring was something she gladly did at church: this was just an extension. She went to his house and he raped her. In shock, she even allowed him to give her a lift home. Full Review

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Review of

The Figurine by Victoria Hislop

5star.jpg General Fiction

It was in 1968 that Helena McCloud made her first trip to Greece. She was alone: her mother, Greek by birth, had left the family home and refused to return, but Mary and Hamish (Helena's parents) felt that it would be a pity if Helena grew up without knowing her grandparents or understanding her Greek heritage. Her trip to the family apartment in up-market Kolonaki would be the first of several annual visits. She grew to love her grandmother and the family's maid, Dina, but was wary - and frightened - of her grandfather, retired general Stamatis Papagiannis. He was proud of his close connections to the Junta and expected his family to uphold his values but saw no reason to accommodate them. His prejudices included Helena's red hair and green eyes - inherited from her father's Scottish ancestors. Full Review

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Review of

After Death by Dean Koontz

3star.jpg General Fiction

Michael Mace, Head of Security, at a top secret biological research facility, is among 55 people who die when a virus is released in a bio-hazard accident. Finding himself in a makeshift mortuary, covered in plastic, he has a sense that something very, very bad has happened to him – and only him – as he sits up and looks around at the shrouded bodies of his dead friends and former colleagues. As he recovers his senses, he realises that there is something different about him; he can feel everything. Everything. Michael isn't Michael anymore. Full Review

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Review of

The Grave Listeners by William Frank

4star.jpg General Fiction

The village is isolated and poor. It's surrounded by a Witching Forest. And the villagers subsist largely by farming Uphegia plants - its bread-like fruit provides nutrition and its blossom provides herbal medicines. The black wood of the forest provides heat and warmth, roofs on homes, and even gallows, if needed. The fear of being buried alive is an existential superstition in the village and that is the reason Volushka, a drunken, self-indulgent, lazy lout of a man is tolerated. Full Review

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Review of

Semi-Detached by Deborah Stone

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Bill and Amanda are living in a semi-detached house, stuck in a depressing rut of boredom and disappointment, when Terry and Fiona – glamorous, successful and very much in love – move in next door. Despite their different outlooks on life, the couples befriend each other and life appears to improve for both pairs. But all is not what it seems, and their increasingly interconnected relationships are fated for tragedy. Full Review

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Review of

The Silent Bride by Shalini Boland

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Alice and Seth are a match made in heaven. He is everything she has been searching for; handsome, accomplished, clever, funny; total and utter husband-material. She is all he could possibly want in a wife; beautiful, successful, confident… and so the inevitable proposal is eagerly accepted by Alice and the wedding is planned and set. When the much-anticipated day arrives, Alice is walked down the aisle by her father, beaming with pride and excitement as she surveys the congregation – their friends assembled to celebrate this joyful day and when Seth turns to face his approaching bride, Alice's world implodes because she has absolutely no idea who the man at the altar is, who is waiting for her to become his wife. Full Review

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Review of

The Girls of Summer by Katie Bishop

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It was the summer when Rachel Evans turned eighteen that she and Caroline went backpacking around Greece and arrived on the island. Rachel wasn't exactly innocent but she was, perhaps, naive, so when thirty-four-year-old Alistair Wright started to take an interest in her, she was flattered rather than wary. It was quite a while before he made any sort of physical approach to her and by that time she was obsessed by him. Alistair worked for Henry Taylor, looking after his interests on the island and in particular in the bar where all the girls either worked or partied. Full Review

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Review of

Three Graces by Amanda Craig

4.5star.jpg General Fiction

Few styles of contemporary fiction interest me like the state-of-the-nation novel. There's something so utterly compelling about any writer who can catch hold of the atmosphere of the day and capture it, crafting an image of the country as it stands in one particular moment. To say that Amanda Craig is skilled at doing this would be embarrassingly inadequate: she's practically synonymous with the genre of contemporary social fiction at this point. She has such a gift for weaving the ongoing issues of the day into the lives of her characters in a way that feels natural and lived-in, never making them ciphers for social commentary but instead fully realised people, grappling with issues far larger than themselves. Full Review

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Review of

Pineapple Street by Jenny Jackson

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Pineapple Street is the story of three women: Sasha, Darley and Georgiana. Darley and George are sisters and Sasha is married to their brother Cord. They're Stocktons, only Sasha isn't a Stockton by birth so she isn't readily accepted into the tribe. The problem's exacerbated when the clan matriarch, Tilda, asks Cord and Sasha if they'd like to move into the Pineapple Street property. Tilda and Chip have renovated and downsized to another property, a street or so away, which they own. They won't need any of the furniture from Pineapple Street, so Sasha and Cord can move straight in. Nominally, they had a choice but that wasn't the reality. Darley and Georgiana start to call Sasha 'the gold digger'. She's living in their family home. They use it so often that they abbreviate it to 'the GD'. Full Review

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Review of

One Puzzling Afternoon by Emily Critchley

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84 year old Edie has lived in the same small town for almost her whole life, but now she is facing a move as her son wants to move to another house and bring Edie to live with his family, as Edie is starting to lose her memory. However, Edie is tormented by the memory of her childhood friend, Lucy, who went missing over 60 years ago, and the worry that there was a secret she was keeping for Lucy that somehow might be the thing that reveals the truth of what happened all that time ago. After 'seeing' Lucy in the high street, just as she was the last time she saw her, she starts to find pockets of memories coming back to her. And yet as she remembers the past, she is forgetting more and more in her day to day life. Will she uncover the truth about Lucy's disappearance before her move, and before her memories are gone forever? Full Review

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Review of

Thirst for Salt by Madelaine Lucas

5star.jpg Literary Fiction

Love, I'd read, was supposed to be a light and weightless feeling, but I had always longed for gravity

Told from a retrospective view, a young woman unravels the year-long relationship that once defined her. Overlaid with later wisdom, the narrator relives the affair with a man twenty years her senior from its inception – the summer after finishing university – to its sorrowful end the summer after. Set against the backdrop of an isolated Australian coastal town Thirst for Salt details the 24-year-old narrator's deepening relationship with her older lover, depicting its all-consuming nature, how it changed her perspective on both romantic and familial relationships and how it altered her irrevocably. Full Review

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Review of

The Garnett Girls by Georgina Moore

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The love affair between Margo Garnett and poet Richard O'Leary was all-consuming, apparently on both sides. Margo was just sixteen when they fell in love. Richard was twenty-one and described by Margo's mother as 'an older man'. Her parents worried that Richard's influence would take her away from what they felt she could achieve - going to Oxford and having a glittering career. In the event, they eloped and Richard took her away from the Isle of Wight. Margo did go to Oxford and went on to become a well-respected journalist. The couple had three children: Rachel, Imogen and Sasha. Life was lived in London and holidays were spent at Sandcove, the family home on the Isle of Wight. Even then the doubts about Richard's drinking were never far from Margo's mind: she would never be able to leave him in charge.

Then Richard left them. Full Review

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Review of

Dashboard Elvis is Dead by David F Ross

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I reviewed David F Ross's book There's Only One Danny Garvey a couple of years back and remember being absolutely floored by how powerful and affecting it was. It was a gripping, emotionally wounding read, and rereading my review of it my main takeaway was that I might not have lavished enough praise on it. Full Review

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Review of

Clara and Olivia by Lucy Ashe

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The year is 1933. The place? Sadler's Wells. Ballerinas Clara and Olivia are sisters, twins no less. Identical on the outside but not, we learn, on the inside. And not on stage, either. Because there's a lot that builds a dancer. Some things that can be taught or learnt – discipline, attention to detail – and some things, that je ne sais quoi, that don't come from the classroom. A stage presence, a charm, a joie de vivre. The difference between a hard-worker, and a star. Full Review

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Review of

Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett

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Emily Wilde is an expert academic scholar on faerie lore, and she has travelled extensively, and researched meticulously, to write her life's work, the very first encyclopaedia of faeries. Whilst she is brilliant at research and speaking to faeries, she is not so good with people. So when she finds herself far, far North in the small village of Hrafvsnik, having somehow offended the village matriarch, she is not sure what she has done, nor how to redeem herself and put her final investigations for her book back on the right track. Enter Wendell Bambleby, her dashingly handsome and insufferable rival who arrives unexpectedly, all charm and delight, much to Emily's frustration. But why is he here? What does he want? And what exactly is going on with the faerie folk around Hravsnik? Full Review

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Review of

The Boy and the Dog by Seishu Hase and Alison Watts (translator)

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First of all, it was the earthquake, deep in the ocean floor, which created the tsunami and this, in turn, caused the nuclear meltdown. The result was complete and utter devastation. The deaths were uncountable, and the loss of livelihoods was widespread. The fact that many pets were separated from their owners came far down the list of priorities but - six months after the tsunami - Kazumasa Nakagaki discovered a dog outside a convenience store. He wasn't a dog person but the convenience store owner's comment that he would call Public Health prompted Kazumasa to open his car door and Tamon the dog jumped in. Full Review

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Review of

Mr Magenta by Christopher Bowden

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Christopher Bowden's latest novel is a patient untangling of a seemingly ordinary woman's life, carried out by her nephew after she has died. The aunt who always provided a safe harbour and a little bit of indulgence to a young nephew had had a much more interesting life than that nephew Stephen had ever realised and it seems to him an obligation to find it all out. Full Review

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Review of

Partitions of Unity by Jennifer Mason

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Here at Bookbag Towers, we first met Elizabeth Cromwell, dominatrix and unintentional detective in Preposterous, when she investigated and unravelled a series of disappearances. In Partitions of Unity, she sets her mind to solving a murder... Full Review

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Review of

The Daves Next Door by Will Carver

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Five strangers come together in one moment as a suicide bomber prepares to detonate his vest on a London tube line. As their fates overlap, the story is told in backwards order, leading up to the fateful moment. Full Review

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Review of

Preposterous: An Elizabeth Cromwell Mystery by Jennifer Mason

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A struggling poetry zine, a mom-and-pop mobile diner in the Northern California redwoods, a 400-meter hurdler who just missed the 2004 Olympics, a women's track coach with a yen for bullwhips, a billionaire with a state-of-the-art S&M dungeon, a man serving a life sentence in Alabama, an enigmatic signature, K(s, x), on a cheap oil painting, an erotic art dealer in Georgia...

This is just a sample of the cast of characters and settings in Preposterous. As you can see, some keeping up will be required! The basic premise of this mystery story goes like this... Full Review

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